I'm not sure...

1995

Are you WebTraveler?

Are you WebTraveler?


I'm pretty sure he is.  ::)

I'm pretty sure he is.  ::)


Oh no....

1996.

I'd say 1995.  In addition to being a huge year for plenty of mid-90s music movements like gangsta rap, eurodance, britpop, pop punk, first wave post-grunge, and contemporary r&b funk, it had just enough of an earlier 90s influence at the beginning to not feel disconnected from 1993 and 1994, while the later months of the year saw the genesis of late 90s trends, which were far from their peaks but would become relevant by 1996-1998.

In terms of early 90s influences, Ren & Stimpy and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air were still on television throughout the year, and a lot of popular music still had classic new-jack swing influences, like Montell Jordan's "This Is How We Do It."  Regular grunge was still decently popular in 1995, thanks to the success of Pearl Jam's Vitalogy album, as well as the release of Alice in Chains' self-titled album near the end of the year.  The Sega Genesis was just starting to suffer in popularity, but people still produced and bought games for the system, not to mention the Super Nintendo was going stronger than ever.  Fashion-wise, grunge styles were still pretty well established this year, even though newer trends like the Rachel cut were coming in.  However, Bush '41-era styles like huge permed hair, eraser cuts, and neon clothing were pretty much totally obsolete by this year.

The ties that 1995 has to the late 90s are few, but still noteworthy.  The year saw the release of both the PlayStation, as well as Internet Explorer; both of these would emerge as critical technologies during the latter half of the 90s, even though their popularity was still pretty miniscule.  There are even some pop songs from late 1995 that have a pretty strong Y2K vibe to them, like Eternal's "Power of a Woman," the Backstreet Boys' "We've Got It Goin' On," and Robyn's "Do You Know (What It Takes)" (released only in Sweden at the time, but still extremely similar to the stuff Britney Spears would sing four years later).  There was also the release of Toy Story, which revolutionized animation and eventually paved the way for further CGI animated classics like Antz, A Bug's Life, and Toy Story 2.  While the Super Nintendo was still clearly the dominant video game console of the day, 3D video games were becoming more and more popular; in addition to the aforementioned PlayStation, a lot of arcade games around this time adopted 3D graphics, like Virtua Fighter 2, Star Wars: Dark Forces, and Tekken 2.

Overall, I consider 1994 to be the quintessential 90s year in general, due to the early 90s standing strong on their own and leaving the biggest mark on pop cultural history, versus the late 90s, which were largely just setting up the 2000s.  However, if I had to pick a year with balanced ties to all parts of the decade, then 1995 takes the cake.